2016-03-18

Canada has seven of the NHL’s 30 teams, and barring a miracle, all seven will miss the playoffs this year – according to Sports Club Stats, the country’s best hope for a postseason appearance rests with the Ottawa Senators, who have just a 1.7% chance of making it. It would be the first time that no Canadian team has made the playoffs since 1970, and back then there were only three.

The arguments he makes are, broadly speaking (and in the order he presents them):

What isn't mentioned, of course, is the real reason all the Canadian teams have been having trouble since Patrick Roy et Les Habs defeated Wayne Gretzky and Kelly Hrudey.

The Liberal Party of Canada.

Down Goes Brown mentions the struggles faced by Canadian teams in the 1990s: teams leaving Winnipeg and Queerbec City, more teams threatening to leave, a lack of a salary cap. The salary cap was finally brought in after the 2004-2005 lockout†, but note that the Calgary Flames ended a decade-long Canadian team drought in the Stanley Cup Playoffs to make it to Game 7 in 2004. (Speaking of conspiracy theories, there's one that the league deliberately botched the call on the Gelinas goal)

The Flames actually kicked off quite the run of Canadian teams making it to the Finals: after Calgary in 2004 and nothing in 2005 there was Edmonton in 2006, Ottawa in 2007, and then Vancouver in 2011. After a decade of no Canadian teams in the Finals, there was a half decade of Canadian teams regularly appearing. A major factor, of course, was the strength of the Canadian dollar. It spent about four months worth more than the U.S. dollar in 2007 and weathered the 2008 economic crisis before finally falling due to a variety of factors. Not entirely coincidentally, one of those factors was Rat Bastard 2.0 becoming Prime Minister. When the Liberal Party of Canada is in charge, the Canadian dollars falls to shit (because the country is being led by shitty retards).

Even the above graphic doesn't tell the full extent of the Liberal duplicity. Notice the uptick in the first chunk of Liberal governance? That would signify the brief reign of Paul Martin, the former Finance Minister who satisfied investors that the disaster who was Jean "blacks should smile more" Chretien was over and done with. Under his leadership the Canadian dollar returned to some levels of sanity, finally culminating in the parity-and-beyond years of Stephen Harper. Those same Harper years that the Canadian left is treating like a Nazi occupation were also the years that the Canadian dollar wasn't assigned to the international financier kiddie table, and, not surprisingly, the end to the Stanley Cup Finals drought. Let's examine that timespan again.

We're talking the definition of small sample sizes here, but note that the Cup drought of the 1990s and early 2000s perfectly lines up with the "stewardship" of Teflon Jean. This information would surely offend the delicate sensitivities of Guardian readers‡, but it's the truth. Under Shiny Pony, don't expect to see the Canadian dollar improve. With that, don't expect a lot of Canadian teams to be competing for the top prize.§

‡ If we want to tack on another sorta conspiracy theory, McIndoe writes for a variety of outlets, but let's just say ignoring the responsibility on bad liberal fiscal management was probably a contractual requirement of them taking on the piece.

§ Barring exports for things that don't rhyme with "foil", this will be true for most things. The low dollar is good for manufacturing in vote-rich Ontario, of course, as it covers up inefficiencies caused by union thuggery and socialized medicine.